Author: Amanda

​Deemed Self Employment Status – Are you Out of IR35? 

For those contractors who have been found to be outside of IR35, read our guidance notes to support your deemed self-employment status, and ensure you can provide the necessary evidence to support your status. 

A note on Substitution

The Substitute should not be a family member or someone the contractor already knows. The Substitute is funded by the contractor, with a documented agreement between the contractor and the Substitute. The Contractor will invoice Certes for the Substitute. 

Should the client be supportive of substitution, but substitution has not yet happened, we recommend the following best practise is followed, to further support self employment status. If substitution is unlikely to happen, other evidence of self-employment will be required, in the form of;

  • Change of Task or Project: Contractors should not agree to be moved to a different task or project than was originally agreed in the contract details. If the Client wishes for there to be a different task to be undertaken, then we must agree this in a different contract schedule, or an amendment to a schedule. 
  • How the Work is Done: Contractors should keep a record of written correspondence with the Client to show that the Contractor and the Client has agreed between them how the work is done. 
  • The Working Schedule: Contractors should keep a record of written correspondence in terms of how they have agreed with the Client regarding the working hours/days to be spent and organised to carry out the work
  • Where the Work is Done: Contractors should keep a record of written correspondence with the Client in terms of how they have agreed where the work is done, or at least that the tasks and the nature of the tasks have dictated where the work is done. 
  • Expenses: Contractors should not claim for expenses, such as business travel, meals, accommodation or other expenses incurred in performing the work or tasks
  • Unsatisfactory Work: Contractors should put work right at their own expense, in their own time where necessary, in order to put right any work that the Client decides is not satisfactory. Where this is done, it should be confirmed in writing to us and the Client, with correspondence between all parties recorded and saved. 

For any specific contract queries talk to your Certes Account Manager.

It's no surprise that advancements in technology in technology and communications has made the transfer of information more streamlined. You have a document that you want to send across the country or even across the world, email it, want to contact colleagues when your out of office or on the road, use your mobile phone. This sounds pretty obvious in this tech savvy age but there was a time when sending information was a slower, laborious process.

According to Raconteur "Organisations that invest in communications technology and collaboration strategies retain staff and reap the rewards of greater productivity and innovation". The updated communications removes the long process that once plagued communication a mere 40 years ago.

The evolution in such a short time is incredible. But what is astonishing is that a large quantity of companies are still using dated technology and methods of communication filing and communication.

One  biggest communication change that has greatly improved how we exchange information is the application of mobile devices. We can do almost everything with these small devices that would once require time and money to accomplish.

 

Improvements in IT shows that  productive goes up overall. More can be done in a shorter window and you are not limited to by location. As IT improves and ease of completing tasks improves with it, productivity could continue to increase. 

Read full article on improved comms technology by Raconteur.

 

Autumn Statement: The UK will now have one of the most inflexible labour markets in the world says APSCo

•    UK in danger of moving from being one of most flexible – to one of most inflexible labour markets in the world 
•    A disaster for public sector talent supply
•    Fury at Government’s wilful disregard of all industry stakeholders and concerns of their own department

Responding to today’s Autumn Statement, Samantha Hurley, Operations Director at The Association of Professional Staffing Companies (APSCo) comments: 

On IR35 Restriction:

“The Government has announced that it is to introduce IR35 tax changes, which will result in Personal Service Company contractors in the public sector losing their right to determine their tax status.  We are furious that the Government has ignored all industry stakeholders and has overridden the concerns of their own department. This change will give recruitment firms and other engagers, who pay the contractor, liability and responsibility for operating payroll and paying the correct taxes to HMRC.

These changes will convert the UK from having one of the most flexible labour markets in the world to having one of the most inflexible labour markets in the world. 

Despite the Government framing this as a duty on the Public Sector to ensure that those who work for them pay the correct tax, the reality is that the vast number of contractors work via recruitment firms and other engagers.  In fact, it is these unconnected third parties that will bear the responsibility and legal liability for making the correct decision on tax status – namely whether the contractor is working in a similar way to an employee, and therefore liable for paying same taxes as an employee, which is an over-simplification of IR35.  

This is a disappointing and illogical move. The public sector will inevitably see its costs rise at a time when budgets are already very tight.  A survey of independent professionals undertaken in July this year by IPSE, a membership body for independent professionals and the self-employed, revealed that 39% of respondents would work on public sector contracts but would increase their day rate to compensate for the extra tax liability. The same survey showed that over 50% of respondents would refuse to work on public sector contracts – or would terminate contracts if required to pay tax and NICs as an employee when delivering services independently.   We are already seeing the public sector’s access to talent being severely impacted – there have been walkouts from a Ministry of Defence Agency which has left several major IT projects on hold.

“The Chancellor has just promised large scale investment in infrastructure and science and digital innovation to the tune of £23bn over the next five years.  However we would question how the public sector will deliver on this promise when HMRC has just destabilised the flexible labour market in the UK, which Government Departments and local& regional Government rely on.” 

APSCo asks what assessment HM Treasury has made of the impact of these changes on the delivery of these projects. We would also be very interested to learn what assessment has been made on public sector labour productivity, which is already low, and could have a dramatic regional impact.

While HMRC has developed an online tool which it says will determine an individual’s tax status, we believe that the public sector, the accountancy profession and the recruitment sector are sceptical as to whether this tool can deliver certainty. Consequently most placements will be treated as within IR35 in order to mitigate risk- this is likely to result in multiple appeals and employment claims against the public sector.

We are also extremely disappointed that the Government has chosen to act now rather than take the more logical approach of waiting for the review of self-employment taxation announced today.  

On Infrastructure & Innovation Investment

“Although we welcome the announcement on the boost to funding for infrastructure and research and development to make the UK a ‘go to’ global destination for innovation in a post Brexit world, we are very concerned that this laudable aim will be defeated by the Chancellor’s short-sighted tax changes.

His failure to recognise the connection between our current flexible labour market and the Government’s aspirations for higher productivity will result in all these projects running way over budget and way over time.

The UK’s ability to prosper in a post Brexit world will depend on our ability to source highly skilled experts – often on a short-term contract – and on a just in time basis.  We would seriously question whether these independent specialists will still be available?

 

Source:Apsco.org

Although writing the requirements for an IT project may seem like quite a trivial task, it can often be a crucial part of communicating the aims and expected outcomes of the project between two parties.  In a recent article published in Analyst Anonymous, Business Analyst Katarzyna Kot of Devoteam gave her top tips for how to make your written requirements clearer and ultimately more successful. 
  1. Keep sentences and paragraphs short. 
  2. Write requirements in the active voice (a does b, not b is done by a). 
  3. Avoid negative (or inverse) requirements. 
  4. Write complete sentences with proper grammar, spelling and punctuation. 
  5. Use terms consistently – define them in a glossary or data dictionary. 
  6. Use a limited vocabulary – a simple subset of English, avoiding terms that may ?confuse non-technical or foreign readers. 
  7. Avoid conjunctions (and, or) that make multiple requirements. 
  8. Avoid let-out clauses or words that imply options or exceptions (unless, except, ?if necessary, but). 
  9. Focus on stating what result the requirement will provide for a stakeholder. 
  10. Use templates for requirement sentences, for example: The <system function>shall provide <system capability> to achieve <goal>. 
These handy tips will work effectively to ensure that all parties, whether it is the client, the web designer or the IT technician, can understand clearly and quickly what the project is going to achieve and how it is going to achieve it. 
 
For more posts on IT topics and IT recruitment, check out our other blogs here. For more content about the BA community, sign up to our dedicated publication Analysts Anonymous.
 

IR35 – Certes Solutions

Following the much anticipated reforms to IR35 in the public sector, as implemented through the off payroll changes (IR35) part 2 income tax (earnings and pensions) act 2003, we have been consulting with clients to advise the best way forward, and have been actively working on a range of solutions to support organisations who are finding themselves caught in the new regulations.

The Government confirmed in the Autumn Statement 2016 that it intends to go ahead with the proposed changes to IR35, as from 6th April 2017. All contracts which are considered to be “inside IR35” will need to be under a compliant arrangement, in line with the changes from this date.

Please see the Guidance last updated on 11th March 2017 – for individuals paid through PSCs.

Our message to Public sector organisations affected by this is that we remain dedicated and focused on the continued supply of our PSC Contractors and those Contractors represented by Umbrella companies from 6th April onwards. But we also want to make it clear that we have developed an Outsourced Model, centred around outcome based services, Statement of Work, or Work Packages. We can offer assurance that the nature of these solutions based agreements falls outside of the intermediaries legislation following the use of the HMRC tool. To date, many of our existing clients have found this approach to be exactly what they need for immediate and swift solution to the imposed IR35 changes and are in the process of transferring Certes’ incumbent contractors to this new Outcome based service. A number of these clients are also including the migration of other PSC contractors to our service, especially those seen to be critical to the organisation.

Through the course of our consultation with our clients, we have seen a high proportion of existing contracts that have not required any changes,  reaching the conclusion that the intermediaries legislation does not apply, as well as some being found to be inside the new legislation. Of course, the outcome is based very much on the specific working practises with the client, and not only the terms and conditions of a contract.

If you remain unsure about the status of your existing intermediary engagements our Public Sector team we will be pleased to meet and discuss the use and completion of the HMRC’s Employment Status Service online tool, to establish the nature of each individual agreement and of course to offer advice about our new solutions. The tool can be found here.

 

Please contact our Public sector team today if you need advice, guidance or examples of successful transitions, on 01675 468968.

A recent study by McKinsey provides further evidence that when IT acts as a partner rather than a waiter, it performs better.

This is why those of us that work within this sector are seeing a greater demand for BRM skills as more Cx0’s realise their importance. However we are also seeing the implementation and subsequent demise of such functions, normally after a few years, once the quick wins have been achieved and the function then struggles to retain its effectiveness and perceived value (which is another blog in itself).

They are various reasons why this can happen, some of which have been discussed in the BRM forums I run, however, one area that has become apparent to me recently is around how the BRM operates within the role (both on individual and departmental basis). I know of BRM functions where every individual performs their position in a different way and departments that operate on a “common sense approach” rather than using defined procedures.  Whilst I appreciate there will be nuances there surely must be a need for best practise and standardisation (a Prince2 of the BRM world) to ensure its continued effectiveness and further demand.

BRMP® and CBRM® courses lead the way in this area at present and I’ve received positive feedback from the delegates who’ve taken the course(s). Perhaps the BRM community might want to consider such training programmes to ensure demand for the BRM role continues to grow?

 

– James

For more information on IT BRM and IT Business Partnership, contact James O’Driscoll

TV shows tend to have a way of paving the course of technology. Star Trek gave us the possibility of using a slab of plastic, metal and glass to provide us with whatever information we desire and even cartoons such as Inspector Gadget gave us the idea of a smart watch. Today, these items are readily available to the public and according to ‘Black Mirror’ the next step in fictional technology materialising into our current zeitgeist is bespoke AI.

For the uninitiated, ‘Black Mirror’ is a series of dark self-contained hour long episodes blending technology and everyday life with a hint of a dystopian not too distant future. The show caught my interest in one of the later episodes titled ‘Be Right Back’. The story starts off with a couple, Ash and Martha moving to their new home in the country. Ash is seen to be compulsive social media user, constantly checking and posting at any given moment. After Ash lost his life in a car accident return the moving van, Martha was left grief-stricken. During the funeral, Martha’s friend Sarah mentioned a service that she should sign up to, a service that would allow for communication between the living and the dead.

The first thing you would think of is a séance or something else of that mystical nature; the service was all down to an app. The app reads all the posts from the deceased social media profiles and creates an AI that perfectly matches the original. Although Martha originally rejects the idea of using the app, she slowly comes around due to loneliness, the potential of hearing from her lover and sheer curiosity. Moments later, Martha receives an email, supposedly from Ash and they start communicating via instant messaging. Martha then decides to upload pictures and voice recordings of Ash to the app so that she can talk to Ash over the phone and to her amazement, the AI sounded exactly like Ash and also shares his distinctive sarcastic wit. Every day Martha calls Ash but on day damages her phone. Instead of feeling angered or worried over losing all the information on her phone, she panics about losing AI Ash. The damage to Martha’s phone is not as serious as she thought and she regains connection with AI Ash. AI Ash comforts Martha that even if her phone is damaged, he is stored on the services server and accessible via the Cloud.

 

I won’t go any further just in case you would like to watch this episode and want to see what happens next.

 

What drew me into this episode is how close we are to actually achieve this level of AI. Companies such as Microsoft (Cortana, Tai), Google (Google Assistant) and Apple (Siri) are dabbling with AI that learns and improves and at times gives the impression of a personality. Ask the latest version of google assistant to “Make you an X” and the response is a magical chime and Google Assistant replying “You are an X”.

With social media being a huge part of our lives, there is nothing that is stopping learning AI to pick up your interests, you humour, potentially your attitude and in fact becoming a ‘virtual’ you.

This technology could have excellent real world applications for those grieving, as it could give users a chance for closure, to say things that they never had the chance to say. But as with anything if it falls into the wrong hands there could be an out of cyber identity thefts.

With Cloud services booming, this gives more credence to an AI version of you being accessible anywhere.

By the end of the episode, I believed that this form of AI will be achievable in the near future. All the technology is available today, so only time will tell whether this ‘service’ will also make an appearance with self-driving cars, self-lacing trainers and virtual reality headsets.

 

Do you see this service appearing in your app store anytime soon?

 

Age is just a number; however, a recent survey by Stack Overflow found that the average age of a developer is 27.  Does this mean the older generation are leaving the profession? Or has there been a large influx of new blood into development?

 

image: StackOverflow

Other areas of the survey may offer some insight. The average developer in the UK has around 6.5 years of experience. This isn’t necessarily commercial experience with students already possessing 3.5 years experience.

 

image: StackOverflow

Another area is salary, while salary by age wasn’t measured, younger people are generally cheaper and with the ever-changing tech landscape older developers may not have kept up to date with new and emerging technologies.

While the study may not be representative of the whole development community but it is certainly eye opening.

I suppose this poses the question ‘will the current generation of ‘Rock star’ developers and ‘C# Ninjas’ be in this profession once they are 35?’

Source: StackOverflow

– Niall

For more information on the developer market, contact Niall Gibson

By 2020, the UK will need around 2.3 million workers with digital skills to fill an influx of 766,000 digital jobs that have been predicted to be created in the next 5 years. This comes from research conducted by O2.

O2 predicts that these digital jobs will mainly be in London and South-East (47% of predicted jobs). Only 8% is predicted to be available in the North West and East of England.

“It’s promising to see so many jobs will be required to fulfill the UK’s digital potential. But we can’t get complacent – these figures highlight that the economy is nowhere near digital maturity and – worryingly – the opportunities that are being created, are predominantly in the south,” O2 business director, Ben Dowd, said.

This seems to be contradictory to what was discussed in a previous post, where it was stated that more people are working outside of London.

Due to O2’s prediction, the telecommunication company has decided to take action in making more digital skilled jobs available outside of London and have partnered up with the St. Helens council to launch a Digital Community pilot aimed at encouraging young people to take an interest in digital jobs in other location a part London.

To accomplish this O2 will be helping local business in applying digital applications which will help those with digital skills to work in and around St. Helens. The end goal is to increase and promote working outside London.

“Raising our digital profile will not only boost our commercial and employment prospects, but help to connect our communities and deal with issues like social isolation,” said St Helens Council leader Barrie Grunewald.

The success of the partnership should persuade other counties to get involved and currently other northern counties are creating digital jobs. A number of initiatives have been put in place to drive this growth, including a £11m government investment in technology incubators in Manchester, Leeds and Sheffield.

Since returning from the Christmas break I have spent the early part of 2017 meeting with senior IT infrastructure professionals on discussing their plans for the coming year. These meetings have included decision makers at multinational corporations to SME’s with internal IT functions. Despite the difference in resources and users one topic continues to dominate the technical direction of IT infrastructures, and that is the cloud.

As predicted 2016 was the year the cloud started to dominate the IT landscape. Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure are still the big players with regards to cloud services. Operator and vendor revenues across the main cloud services and infrastructure market segments hit £120.5bn in 2016 growing at 25% annually, according to the latest note from analyst firm Synergy Research.

With the cloud being such a relevant subject for 2017 I’m always interested in technical developments and how this is going to impact the IT industry in the coming months and years.

Google’s Cloud Platform has been playing catch up to AWS and Azure for a number of years and only launched their public cloud offering in 2012 – 6 years after AWS. However since the appointment of VMware co-founder Diane Greene in late 2015 the direction of Google’s cloud service changed direction for the better and 2017 might be time to take note of Google’s cloud service.

For example Google has announced the launch of Cloud Key Management Service (KMS), which enables admins to manage their encryption keys in Google Cloud Platform without maintaining an on-premise management system.

A KMS activates computers on a local network, eliminating the need for individual computers to connect. The news marks Google’s entry into this particular security arena, following AWS and Microsoft who launched such initiatives as far back as 2014 and 2015 respectively.

“Customers in regulated industries, such as financial services and healthcare, value hosted key management services for the ease of use and peace of mind that they provide,” wrote Maya Kaczorowski, Google Cloud Platform product manager in a blog post. “Cloud KMS offers a cloud-based root of trust that you can monitor and audit.

“As an alternative to custom-built or ad-hoc key management systems, which are difficult to scale and maintain, Cloud KMS makes it easy to keep your keys safe,” Kaczorowski added.

This is just one example of another cloud provider outside the big 2 improving their service to try and gain market share. It’s going to be interesting to see what other cloud innovations we’re going to see in 2017 and how the land lays in 2018.

I’d be interested to hear how organisations are approaching the cloud and how it is impacting their IT infrastructure this year. How will affect the service you provide? Will experience with cloud technologies influence your recruiting decisions? Please comment with any thoughts or opinions below.

Phil Lillicrapp 

– Recruitment Consultant – Infrastructure Specialist

 

For more information on virtualisation and cloud technology market, contact Phil Lillicrapp